


elevated to a spark

by TolkienGirl



Series: All That Glitters Gold Rush!AU: The Full Series [229]
Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Honoring the dead and caring for the living, Hurt/Comfort, Memories, Past Torture, Past Violence, Tattoos, Trauma, bringing back Violet Tibbs the terrible influence from Mae's past, mature themes, title from a poem by Paul Celan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-28
Updated: 2020-04-28
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:54:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23884099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TolkienGirl/pseuds/TolkienGirl
Summary: Wachiwi walks through water. The shapes of people and the beckoning hands of light swim around them as she directs their progress away from the bustling heart of the camp. Away from that tent, where Fingon’s heart remains.
Relationships: Fingon | Findekáno & Fingon's Wife, Fingon | Findekáno & Maedhros | Maitimo, Fingon | Findekáno & Wachiwi
Series: All That Glitters Gold Rush!AU: The Full Series [229]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1300685
Comments: 3
Kudos: 23





	elevated to a spark

Night again—but no promise of sleep. The packed earth will not change on the other side of canvas. It will not fail beneath his feet.

No. It is Fingon who will fail; who _has_ failed. The knife was the last steady thing in his hand, and he has seen the work of other knives now.

Wachiwi is waiting for him in the dark. Despite her teasing, she is silent as she watches him come out.

In the last instant before he breaks before her, he prays, hopelessly. His prayer is not answered. The tears rise up to and swallow him.

Breathing is like that, sometimes: overtaken by a flood.

Father had asked him to come.

It was February—a week after absent Finrod’s birthday, to be exact—and Fingon would have rather been out and about on grimy streets, ducking into doorways to wrap infirm throats in clean red flannel. Would rather grind herbs to fragrant dust, tie them in sachets, make no promises he could not keep…

 _I think I am learning what it is to be a man of the world_ , he said seriously to Doctor Olorin, the other day.

He was immediately afraid that Doctor Olorin would laugh.

The doctor did not laugh. Instead he said, very gravely, _If this is how you are to be, still so far from even your twentieth year_ —

So. Mockery came in its own way.

But Fingon had not minded Doctor Olorin’s mockery, then. Not as much as he minded Father’s sincere invitation _now_. He had not been _in society_ , of late.

Yet, some duties could not be avoided forever. Father pursued his business, as Fingon had (somewhat) come to understand he should, and, on occasion, Father tried to include him in it.

It was not possible to say, on each occasion, _I shall never cease to be a doctor, no matter what you do_.

Fingon had a suit of clothes that fitted him well, that were not threadbare. In these, he had dressed with grudging precision. They had taken the carriage. Father had been lost in thought, and Fingon had not spoken over the sound of rattling wheels.

Fingon was outdone in fashion by every other gentleman in the Tibbs’ drawing room, but that was not unexpected. Erasmus Tibbs was a banker; his son had attended the same prestigious school as Maedhros and Maglor; his daughter Violet was a famed beauty.

Fingon knew all of this, though he didn’t want to. He had never liked Clement, nor had Clement liked him. Fingon had hoped, in his younger days, that Clement and Maedhros weren’t friends.

He’d never asked.

And as for Violet—

Fingon didn’t trust her. She had been something of a bully, in her younger days. The last time they had dined together had been five years ago, when Fingon was both young enough to _be_ bullied, and too certain of the need for piety to offer any defense on his own account.

Now, he understood that piety had a place alongside other principles. And Violet—she, too, seemed…changed.

She was the youngest woman at this supper; Clement was not in attendance and the rest of the guests were men and their wives of Fingolfin’s set. Violet was seated across from Fingon, dressed in a gown of pearl-white taffeta that made her golden hair shine. Fingon knew what taffeta was, due to the company he _did_ keep.

As they dined, her eyes met his often, and he blushed. He knew that young men blushed when they had their heads turned by a pretty girl—it was not that sort of blush.

Fingon blushed when he was angry, or disconcerted, or even when he was heart-stung.

These days—this winter—

The last sensation had not _ruled_ him; he would not allow it to. But he was exposed in his feelings by virtue of being unused to gatherings such as these; unaccustomed to the glances that Violet sent his way.

He hoped to escape her after the meal, but he could not.

“Father collects a rather dull party, does he not?”

He bowed, but made no answer.

“I should be grateful, I suppose, that _you_ are my Finwean this evening.”

Fingon was taken aback at that. “What?”

Violet lifted the thin porcelain to her lips, sipped at the bitter dregs, then lowered it. She had a sweet mouth. “Consider your cousin Maedhros,” she purred. “He has a tendency to be a little saucy. And that would not suit a quiet evening such as this one, would it?”

“I do not take your meaning, ma’am,” Fingon replied.

“ _Ma’am_? You make me sound so old, _sir_. I meant no offense! Mr. Feanorian has _many_ a charm. And what a silver tongue! You must tell him how I miss it, dear little Fingon.”

“Miss—what?”

“His tongue, of course!” She laughed, and set aside the eggshell cup. “A skilled conversationalist is as difficult to find as an honorable man. I hoped you would be…well, you are _one_ , but can you be the other? You are still so _shy_. Do you remember how I teased you, when we were small?”

Fingon could feel even his ears reddening. He did not like her insinuations. He did not like the smile that seemed to color her eyes more than it shaped her lips. He knew when he was being mocked; how did Father bear it? Had Father _really_ garnered enough respect to forever escape such humiliation?

Violet’s voice dragged him back. “Has he always dreamt of being a sailor, your cousin?”

And yes of course, _that_ is what he is thinking of, _that_ is what has cast him into this present misery, this past memory—

(Fingon remembers the sting of salty air on his skin. His shirt and coat balled in his hands; the hairs on his arms standing up. It was strange and uncomfortable, to be half-dressed before others, but he was giddy with his own courage and more than a little drink.

The captain cleaned the needle (Fingon was glad for that), and began his scrawl against Maitimo’s white skin—)

Should it have hurt him more, to see his cousin’s name bitten across the once-clean lines of his breast and shoulders?

Or was it his right to grieve the foolish, reckless, carefree ink that had been, in its time, a chosen mark?

(He weeps for both losses.)

“Come now, Fingon,” Wachiwi whispers. She does not call him by one of her cheerful epithets. Her voice is a thread (yellow), drawing him towards her. “Come now. You needn’t fight me.”

He _has_ been fighting. He didn’t—he didn’t know that, until she said it aloud. He goes still. His hands on his knees. His shoulders still shaking. Where is he, in this world?

 _Here_ , answer her arms around him. _Here,_ as if there is no one else to see, no one else to hold him.

He left his father where his father belonged. He cannot ask anyone else—

After a time, her hands find his. The thread pulls up, up. Fingon stands. His head aches. It is night, and he has no mirrored water in which to gaze, no sun to shine on him and reveal what he is.

“Food, and water,” Wachiwi announces. Her voice is firm. “To drink, and then to wash.”

Fingon follows her. Her hand laced through his is warm, strong. He has felt it before—on his brow, when he was too weak to play doctor. On his shoulder. She is frank and affectionate. Utterly unlike those who lie, those who simper, those who are false friends.

Fingon feels as if he has been a false friend. If he unravels further—

Another wave shall rise.

But Wachiwi walks through water. The shapes of people and the beckoning hands of light swim around them as she directs their progress away from the bustling heart of the camp. Away from _that_ tent, where Fingon’s heart remains.

“Sit here,” she says, leading him to one of the more remote fire-pits. Beren is there, but he vacates his seat at once, nodding his farewells. Fingon did not hear Wachiwi bid him to go away. Perhaps she did nothing, with words.

He sits, heavily. The bones of his hip, the curve of his spine—they are stiff and painful with long hours of stooping, of steadying himself and others. But underneath him, the earth does not fail. He can feel another sob climbing his ribs.

He knows this is why his father sent him away.

It is also why he did not want to go.

“Fingon,” Wachiwi says, still in that gentle voice that stops just short of pitying, “I’ll return.”

He does not ask her to promise.

What bold winter birds remain in this land are silent. The wind speaks, but it does so cautiously. Nothing—not the quality of air, not the color of the shadows, not even the chill—reminds him of the mountain.

He wonders if he would find his own ghost wandering the forest at the mountain’s roots, kept alive and driven wild by dreams of a different Maedhros.

Fingon’s hands dangle over his knees. But for a few abrasions, but for a blackened nail, they do not look like butcher’s hands. They do not look like they have hurt and healed at the same time.

Indeed, they are rather small, there in the half-dark.

Wachiwi does return. With her, she carries dry-crusted bread and a sun-withered apple. She offers him water, and a little of Wister’s strong spirits.

Fingon takes it all, somehow grateful that there is no meat. The food is otherwise without taste or meaning. When he has eaten, without protest—without turning up his stomach, as Maedhros did—he does not even remember what else he intended to do.

Where he intended to go. Back to the tent, perhaps, if he can bear it—if he can command his body to rule and his mind to be merely useful.

(He has done this before.)

Wachiwi brought a pail with her, too, not for drinking. He sees it gleaming red and silver, beside the fire.

“You’ve done a great service,” Wachiwi says, “You’ve honored your cousin and your father. But you should wash. Understand?”

The sob loses its way between his ribs. Fingon blinks. “I—oh.” It is true. He has not seen to the shallow wounds made by Mairon’s blade. They should be cleaned. There is a wound behind his ear also; when he thinks of it, it sings with newfound pain.

His hair is matted with sweat, blood, and soil.

“I—” The night is cold. The water will be cold, too. Fingon has endured greater hardships. Has welcomed them, even, when he thought they meant hope. Now he is daunted. Aimless with exhaustion.

“I can help you,” Wachiwi murmurs. “If you allow it.”

Long after, he considers _that_ a promise of sorts.

Wachiwi folds his coat after he shucks it off. He removes his shirt with numb hands, dragging it up and over his head. The cold stings. The wounds sting. She examines them without laying so much as a finger against raw flesh.

“A knife made them,” he says. “No poison, at least, I pray not.” He is not ashamed to be seen. He has always been so scrupulous, so _modest_. They jibed him for it, once.

“The bleeding has dried up,” Wachiwi says. “No use bandaging, until you’ve washed your hair.”

“Hair?”

In the flickering light, he sees her smile. “If you don’t, birds will raise their young there ,soon.”

He swallows. He must have tasted the apple, after all; there is an unwelcome touch of sweetness on his swollen tongue. “I do not mean to leave it as it is,” he says at last. “But I think the time has come to cut it off. What use, to keep it long? I have—” As if to force his point, he reaches for his knife.

It is the same knife. _God_ , the same knife!

Wachiwi’s hand again. He will remember it always, so many times has it touched him, this night. “Not like that,” she whispers. “You would hurt yourself.”

Fingon cannot speak.

Wachiwi unfolds his coat, gives it to him. He gathers it around his bare shoulders. She pours half the pail into the round Dutch Oven, and sets it in the coals. She says,

“She never took another husband. My mother.”

Is this pity? Fingon hopes not.

“In some cultures, there is no second marriage,” Wachiwi says. “The Hopi, maybe. Their women are the center. The men come to them, I hear. My people—it was different. My mother should have married my uncle, when my father died. But she did not like him. And when my time came, and my sister’s…she did not want us to leave her, so young.” That is all she says for some time. The water warms, and she pours it back into the pail, mingling hot with cold, before she asks, “Will you let me?”

Fingon nods. Removes his coat and turns his back to her.

“Not yet,” she says. “Here, put the coat back on again. It is cold.”

He does, feeling foolish.

“I’ll start with your braids,” she says. “The thread has held well. Shall I save it?”

The thread was bright, a friendly color.

The tattoos on their shoulders were foolish, and should have lasted forever. Black in the shadows, Fingon’s will.

What are the lessons Fingon was meant to learn in New York, beyond those painstakingly taught by Doctor Olorin? And what good does it do now, for Wachiwi to save the yellow threads?

(He nods.)

Her fingers move swiftly. The pain of each tugged snarl is no more than a mild twinge. Nothing to speak of.

(They branded Maedhros a dozen times. Not lightly, as cattle are branded. These were deep enough to leave puckered hollows along his thigh, inside his arm.)

“Cut it off?” Wachiwi murmurs, the laughter returning to her voice. “What a waste that would be. It’s strong as horse-hair. You should value it.”

Fingon forgets that he cannot speak, and says, “You are pulling half of it out of my head.”

She pats his temple with two fingers. “Ah, ah. I am sorry.”

When she is ready, he throws the coat aside and kneels, leaning forward with his head bowed towards her. Wachiwi splashes warm water, applies soap that smells of tallow, then scrubs and rinses by turns.

Fingon’s neck aches. His eyes sting, also. Perhaps a little soap has crept in.

Wachiwi, as she washes, says, “My mother was a warrior, in her way. She protected us. Because of her, that path seemed to stretch before us forever. What had we to fear, my sister and I? She had defied the world, but we lived. It made us brave.”

She parts his hair and plaits each side to wring out the water, then loosens it again.

“I was gone when raiders came to our camp,” she says. “A hunt saved my life, and ended theirs. When I found them, their bodies had been treated like other women’s.”

Fingon takes the clean shirt she offers and dries his eyes, his neck. What can he say to her?

They must have known that the anchor meant something to Maedhros.

They must have known his sins, his loves, his secrets.

_And fear ye not them that kill the body, yet are not able to kill the soul…_

Fingon was (is, and shall always be) a doctor. He tries to save the body, too. Is he a fool to do so?

(What is he?)

A doctor must divide his mind from his patient’s. Must keep his mind on the wound, not on the human face. But what was in his cousin’s eyes, what blood and agony spilled from his lips, when his murderers profaned his flesh with mocking pain?

When Fingon breathes, he trembles. When he speaks, the words run river-wild, like thoughts. He hopes Wachiwi can hear them.

 _All this time_ , he tells her, _I was bitter. I believed that he was culpable—that because I thought him strong, he had strength enough to choose the fate which befell us. I see now that he did not choose. Who could choose—_ that _? The—the loss—_ God _, I cannot. I cannot tell you. Forgive me, I pray you. It would be wrong of me to break this silence. It does not belong to me_.

 _Fingon_ , she says, low and steady, _I did not ask you to tell me._

_But you told me of your mother, your sister. You told me—you told me of your grief._

_And it is not an exchange. There is no price for sorrow. I only wanted you to know that you were not alone._

Wachiwi cleans the wound behind his ear, and tends also to the scratches on his back. Those are no deeper than the lash of a whip, she assures him, knowing not that that is cold comfort.

At least Fingon does not care much, for his own skin.

“Come to me in the morning,” she commands. He cannot see her, now that they have left the fireside. She plans to return to it, since no fire should be left unattended, but first she insists that he sleep an hour or so.

“You will wake me in an hour?”

“Gwindor will.”

Gwindor has stepped out of the shadows, between Fingon and the _other_ tent.

“You’ve fixed him up?”

“He’s the doctor,” Wachiwi says, clapping a hand on his shoulder. “I did very little.”

It isn’t so. Fingon turns—reaches for her hand—

In the dark, she does not see his foolish gesture, and he draws his hand back. How tempting it is to retreat to old politeness, and bow!

“The morning,” he stutters at last. “What—what will you need from me in the morning?”

Wachiwi answers, for only him to hear, “I shall make new braids in your hair.”


End file.
